Denton Recycling Center

Welcome to Safety-Kleen's home page for our Denton, Texas, recycling facility. Here you will find useful background information about the Denton Recycling Center, as well as links to other sources of information regarding the facility's permitting and operations.

Safety-Kleen's Denton Recycling Center has been operating in Denton, Texas, for more than 30 years and manages materials that would otherwise be disposed of or discarded so that valuable, reusable components can be recovered and reused. Doing so reduces the amount of material that ultimately ends up being disposed of, helping the environment by reducing the volume of material that ends up in disposal facilities.

The recycling center is a highly-regulated facility, which means that all activities - from the design of the facility, to what is brought in and how it is managed - are all subject to regular local, state and federal review. In essence, everything that occurs at the site is permitted, overseen and approved by various local, state and federal regulatory agencies.

Safeguards

The Denton Recycling Center has a variety of procedures, plans and relationships that ensure safe, environmentally protective operations.

The facility exists and operates pursuant to the federal Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA), which requires and regulates the management of hazardous wastes in the US, and its operations are overseen by the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality. Under its permits, the facility temporarily stores industrial and hazardous wastes, all in approved tanks and container storage areas, while that material awaits treatment and shipment. Nothing is stored on-site permanently.

All of the facility's air emissions are permitted and routinely tracked, reported and publicly disclosed to ensure that they are within legally established limits. The facility also manages flammable materials, and has built-in fire suppression and safety systems (required under operating permits and regularly inspected and tested), fire-trained personnel, and very detailed, regulated procedures for receiving, testing, storing, treating and packaging the materials managed at the facility. We also work in close cooperation with the Denton Fire Department to ensure both awareness and readiness to respond should the need arise.

The City of Denton has also engaged in significant, detailed emergency planning for the community in the last decade, including coordination with state and federal officials, identifying sources of risk in the community, appointing an Emergency Coordinator, developing plans to deal with a variety of emergency scenarios, including natural and industrial emergencies, running training drills, and creating a hazardous materials management capability. Emergency planning is not driven by any one facility or possible event in the community, but instead applies to the entire Denton community and the range of possible emergency situations that could arise.

Economic Impact

The Denton Recycling Center provides approximately 120 jobs locally, with an annual payroll of $4.1 million. The facility pays $125,000 in taxes every year, spends hundreds of thousands of dollars with local businesses for goods and services, and donates significant amounts of time and money to local charitable efforts. Most Safety-Kleen Recycling Center employees live in Denton, and facility services are provided to many local companies.